Chapter 7: HR
The latch clicked softly as Seraphina slipped out into the hallway, the scent of jasmine lingering faintly behind her. Alex will be mine, the thought hissed in the sudden quiet, a cold certainty that propelled me forward from my hiding place in the deep shadows near the wardrobe. On silent, determined hands and knees, the rough edge of the small dog door scraped against my shoulder as I squeezed through into the dim, candlelit sanctuary, the air thick with perfume and the soft, rhythmic sound of Alex breathing, asleep on the rumpled sheets.
The sheets rustled cool against my hip as I slid into the space beside him, the mattress dipping under my weight. "Sweetheart, the P-85s need your signature before morning," I murmured, placing the crisp forms and a pen on his bare chest.
He blinked sleepily, fingers fumbling for the pen as I watched the nib scratch across each designated line below the eerie candlelight.
The pen clattered onto the sheets as I snatched the final signed form, his name now mine. "Good boy," I breathed against his ear, my fingers tracing his throat's pulse like a claim stamp on a deed.
"Good boy," I breathed against his ear, my fingers tracing his throat's pulse like a claim stamp on a deed. He is my husband now; I claimed him fully, our union fierce and consuming beneath the flickering candlelight, the signed P-85s forgotten beside us. It was divine, utterly divine, until the moment he came, his voice rough and ancient, uttering words like stones dropped into a still pool – "By blood and bone, by breath and seed, I bind thee." WHAT.?? He just bound me??? How??
The latch clicked like a bone snapping. Sersphina’s presence filled the doorway, her fury swirling into the room like invisible knife blades scraping against the walls. She crossed the floor in three swift strides, her cold mouth meeting mine in a kiss that tasted of salt and the iron tang of blood—her ‘blessed consumption’ sealing my place. Then, like marionettes with cut strings, our drained bodies collapsed onto the sheets beside Alex, and the deep, unnatural sleep claimed us all.
Sunlight stabbed my eyes, the scent of burnt waffles thick and greasy in the air where jasmine and blood had hung hours before. Serephinam, grinning like a jackal at her laptop across the gleaming kitchen island, had livestreamed every gasp, every binding word, every treacherous kiss – and Seraphina, pale as death beside me, just got promoted again for her 'innovative team documentation'.